Effects of exercise on sleep spindles in Parkinson's disease.
Adeel Ali Memon, Corina Catiul, Zachary Irwin and 8 others
PMID 36188974WHAT IT FOUND
Exercise did not change sleep spindle density or amplitude across the whole night in people with Parkinson's disease.
It did slow a decline in spindle density during the first half of the night, and this change correlated with better memory scores in the exercise group only.
Key findings
01There were no significant differences between groups in changes in sleep spindle density or amplitude when evaluated for the entire night.
02Exercise attenuated the decrease in spindle density seen in the control group during the first half of the night, with a moderate effect size.
03Changes in sleep spindle density in the exercise group were correlated with changes in memory domain performance.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for PTsWhat it means for OTsWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
This was a post-hoc, exploratory analysis, not the primary outcome of the original trial. The study did not correct for multiple comparisons, increasing the risk of finding a false positive result. The sample size was small (50 participants). Five participants were excluded from the analysis due to unusable sleep study files. The significance of the findings is limited to the first half of the night; the whole-night and second-half analyses were null.
Declared interests
Funding was provided by NINDS and NIH. Authors reported receiving training fellowships from these sources.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that exercise improves sleep spindles overall. The analysis showed no significant change in spindle density or amplitude for the entire night. The positive finding was limited to preventing a decline in the first half of the night in an exploratory sub-analysis, and the correlation with memory was only significant in the exercise group.